MR. CAMERA

Real Name: Unrevealed

Class: Human technology-user

Occupation: Professional criminal

Group Affiliation: None

Known Relatives: None

Aliases: None

Base of Operations: Gotham City

First Appearance: Batman I #81 (February, 1954)

Powers: Mr. Camera wore a camera-helmet, and used photographic equipment, such as strobe lights, in his crimes. He possessed a battery of camera equipment and a giant projector.

History: (Batman I #81) - Mr. Camera was a crook obsessed with cameras, wearing a camera helmet he used photographic equipment to commit crimes, usually stealing high-end cameras. Batman and Robin encountered him on a number of occasions, but were unable to catch him. Batman foresaw that Mr. Camera would try to steal a 3-D camera during a demonstration, and attended the event in his civilian identity. When Camera made his move Bruce (Batman) Wayne and Dick (Robin) Grayson changed into Batman and Robin in the alley behind the theatre, and followed Mr. Camera to his lair, apprehending him. Unfortunately for them Mr. Camera was fond of recording their crimes, and his goons had tipped him off that Batman and Robin came from the alley where he had one of his cameras set up. He knew they must have changed there, and said he'd hidden the film, but after getting out of prison and exposing it he'd expose their identities. Months went by without a word from Camera, but one day he sent a threatening note; he'd told a trusted prisoner the location of the film, and bragged that when his friend was released in a month he'd expose their identities. The Dynamic Duo had to get ahead of the story, so Dick revealed his identity to his classmates, changing into costume, and performing acrobatic tricks. The media hounded Bruce, who said Dick was only trying to impress a classmate he had a crush on, and said he'd prove he was not Batman. Alfred was supposed to dress up as Batman and meet Bruce for a press conference, but he broke his leg after falling in the snow, so Bruce appeared to the press and directed their attention to Batman and the Batplane on a roof, and had a civil conversation with the hero before he flew off. He'd pulled off the hoax by having Robin remote-control the Batplane while he used ventriloquism to "speak" to a snowman dressed up as Batman, and incinerating it with a thermal bomb before the Batplane took off. It turned out his scheme was for nothing because Mr. Camera's photos were badly underexposed.

Comments: Created by David Vern & Sheldon Moldoff.